AMERICAN ACADEMY OF DEVELOPMENTAL MEDICINE & DENTISTRY
Can Parents with Disabilities Care for their Children?
BY H. BARRY WALDMAN, DDS, MPH, PHD, RICK RADER, MD, FAAIDD, FAADMD, DHL (HON) AND STEVEN P. PERLMAN, DDS, MSCD, DHL (HON)
"Exceptional Parent Magazine provides advice, emotional support, and the most up-to-date educational information for families of children and adults with disabilities and special health care needs." (Internet description of the magazine)
The title of the publication emphasizes (rightfully) the Exceptional Parent. The care and support of the members of the family with disabilities impacts upon the parents; in most situations, the mother (and grandmother). What if the mother has a disability? Can she provide the needed care? The titles of a series of studies and articles detail the difficulties, outcomes, and consequences.
• Parents with disabilities: these moms live in fear of losing their kids 1
• Disabled parents face bias, loss of kids 2
• Can parents lose custody simply because they are disabled? 3
• For parents around the country, having a disability can mean losing custody of their kids 4
• Disability and discrimination in custody battles 5
SPECIFICS
"Millions of Americans with disabilities have gained innumerable rights and opportunities since Congress passed landmark legislation on their behalf in 1990. And yet advocates say barriers and bias still abound when it comes to one basic human right: To be a parent. (emphasis added) …A California woman paid an advance fee to an adoption agency, then was told she might be unfit to adopt because she has cerebral palsy." 2 Historically, society has been worried about people with disabilities becoming parents.
"In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many Americans grew infatuated with the American eugenics movement, which sought to 'breed' a superior race through government intervention. This led to Buck v. Bell, a 1927 Supreme Court decision that allowed states to sterilize inmates of public institutions who they considered to be 'mentally unfit' or generically inferior. The ruling… allowed at least 70,000 forced sterilizations (without consent) …Justice Oliver Wendell Homes Jr., who wrote the decision, declared: 'Three generations of imbeciles are enough.'"6 (emphasis added)
Mothers with disabilities, were (and are) often told that having children will worsen their conditions, that their disabilities will be passed on to their children, and that they won't be competent mothers. "The majority of parents with disabilities have a fear of their children being apprehended, because you know you are being watched (by Social Service Organizations) right, wrong or otherwise." 1
• Even if they are struggling, they are afraid to ask for help, because they are seen as a bad parent failing to meet all the needs of their children, and it must be because of their disability.
• The U.S. legal system is not adequately protecting the rights of parents with disabilities. Child welfare laws in most states allow courts to determine that a parent is unfit on the basis of a disability.
• Parents with all types of disabilities – physical or intellectual – are more likely to lose custody of their children after divorce, have more difficulty accessing assisted-reproductive treatments to bear children and face significant barriers to adopting children.1
• "… the bias against parents with disabilities is such that judges tend to grant custody to an able-bodied partner, even if they have a history that might usually be a heavy mark against them – not having been in the child's life, a history of violence, etc." 3
• " … a young mother with an intellectual disability, had her twoday-old daughter taken by the state of Massachusetts and placed in foster care. Specifically, the state believed she was unable to care for her newborn because of her disability… officials said she displayed with feeding and diapering. While these are common challenges for most new mothers,(sic) … it led to a battle involving the federal government." 4
• " … parents with disabilities often contend with bias and speculation concerning their parenting ability, especially by the child welfare system, (sic)… " 4
More than two-thirds of state child welfare laws still allow for a parent's disability to be considered for the purposes of terminating parental rights. A recent study found that 19 percent of children in foster care had been removed from their home at least in part because they had a parent with a disability. 4
• According to the National Council on Disability, "The child welfare system is ill-equipped to support parents with disabilities and their families, resulting in: 1) the disproportionately high rates of involvement with child welfare services and 2) devastatingly high rates of parents with disabilities losing their parental rights… Oftentimes, disabled parents are not receiving the accommodations they are entitled to. Too often, decisions are made to prevent a child from going home, without providing parents a fair opportunity to parent." 4
• "… disability rates are higher among Black and Native parents, (sic) meaning that many parents with disabilities face double discrimination because of their multiple marginalized identities. As persons of color and parents (with disabilities), our abilities are often second-guessed, given a side-eye, and profiled in disproportionate ways." 4
• The right to raise a family is undeniably one of our most cherished in the United States. However, for people with disabilities, especially those from marginalized communities, it is often challenged solely because of bias and speculation. 4
CONSIDER
"Imagine you are a parent who has overcome a disability. The disability could be physical that confines you to a wheelchair; or a psychiatric disability that requires you to take medication. You are living a perfectly normal life with your disability, so much so that your disability isn't really a disability in your mind - it is just part of living. You have learned to overcome what some other people who had a similar diagnosis have not yet learned to overcome. The disability has proved that you have the ability to live a normal life." 5
Then imagine that you are now going through a divorce, you have children and you need to go to court to fight for custody of your children Although you have been the primary caregiver for your child or children, a judge now decides that you are unfit for custody of your child. Imagine!
A CHANCE TO SUCCEED: "Oftentimes, disabled parents are not receiving the accommodations they are entitled to. Too often, decisions are made to prevent a child from going home, without providing parents a fair opportunity to parent."
YOU ARE NOT ALONE
"Research indicates that parents with disabilities and their families are over-represented in the child welfare system. While parents with disabilities make up only 6.2 percent of all parents in the United States, a recent study found that 19 percent of children in foster care have a parent with a disability." 7 "35 states include disability as grounds for termination of parental rights." 5
Indeed, EP Magazine is a publication for all families with youngsters and the not-so-young with disabilities, as well as their caregivers – especially mothers (and grandmothers), who themselves may have disabilities.•
ABOUT THE AUTHORS:
H. Barry Waldman, DDS, MPH, PhD is a SUNY Distinguished Teaching Professor, Department of General Dentistry, Stony Brook University, NY. E-mail: h.waldman@stonybrook.edu. Rick Rader, MD, DHL (Hon) is the Director of the Morton J. Kent Habilitation Center, Orange Groove, Chattanooga, TN; Senior VP Public Policy, American Academy of Developmental Medicine and Dentistry; Adjunct Professor, Human Development, University of Tennessee-Chattanooga. He is Exceptional Parent Magazine's Editor in Chief. Steven P. Perlman, DDS, MScD, DHL (Hon) is the Global Clinical Director and founder, Special Olympics, Special Smiles; and Clinical Professor of Pediatric Dentistry, The Boston University Goldman School of Dental Medicine.
References
1. Tomasi P. The Huffington Post Canada. Parents with disabilities: these moms live in fear of losing their kids. Available from: huffingtonpost.ca/2015/05/10/parents-with-disabilities_n_7251484.html Accessed October 13, 2020.
2. CBS News. Disabled parents face bias, loss of kids: Report. Available from: cbsnews.com/news/disabled-parents-face-bias-loss-of-kids-report Accessed October 13, 2020.
3. Powell R. American Bar Association. Can parents lose custody simply because they are disabled? Available from: americanbar.org/groups/gpsolo/publications/gp_solo/2014/march_april/can_parents_lose_custody_simply_because_they_are_disabled/ Accessed October 13, 2020.
4. Powell R. Rewire News Group. For parents around the country, having a disability can mean losing custody of their kids. Available from: rewirenewsgroup.com/article/2018/03/12/parents-around-country-disability-can-mean-losing-custody-kids/ Accessed from: October 13, 2020.
5. Heroux P. Huffpost. Disability and discrimination in custody battles, Available from: huffpost.com/entry/disability-and-discrimina_b_5616446 Accessed October 13, 2020.
6. Fayyad A. The whole purpose of forcibly sterilizing women was to root out undesirable genes. Boston Globe. Available from: Abdallah.fayyad@globe.com Accessed October 19, 2020.
7. Parent Rights Foundation. Parental rights and disabilities. Available from: parentalrightsfoundation.org/parental-rights-and-disabilities/#parents Accessed October 14, 2020.